$100,000 bail set for knifepoint rape suspect

LOCKPORT – Bail was set at $100,000 Wednesday for a Niagara Falls man charged with raping a woman at knifepoint Oct. 7.

Roy Reynolds, 57, of 13th Street, pleaded not guilty before Niagara County Judge Sara Sheldon Farkas to an indictment charging him with predatory sexual assault, first-degree rape and third-degree criminal possession of a weapon. If convicted, he could face life in prison.

Niagara Falls police said at the time that the woman was attacked in an alley off the 500 block of 15th Street. Deputy District Attorney Holly E. Sloma said the woman was a short-term acquaintance of Reynolds.

“He picked her up in his car and asked her if she wanted to party. She said no. She then remembers being punched by the defendant, her head hitting the inside of his car, and then being taken to an alley,” Sloma said.

“[Reynolds] said this [sex] was consensual but had no explanation for the injuries on the victim’s body,” the prosecutor told Farkas.

Reynolds is being held as a parole violator for a 1999 incident in which he drew 10 years in prison for attacking his then-wife with a hatchet in front of their 11-year-old son, “saying something to the effect of, ‘Watch me kill your mother,’ ” Sloma said.

“This is a violent individual,” Sloma said, “an individual who should not be on the street.”

Defense attorney Rodney A. Giove said Reynolds has a 14-month-old son who is being cared for by his now-adult son.